When Twitter’s Jack Dorsey tweeted Hassan Rouhani in 2013 to ask if any of the citizens of his country were able to read the Iranian president’s tweets, he probably did not expect a response. To the surprise of many in the West, Mr Rouhani quickly shot back a friendly missive that access to global information for Iranians “is their #right”...

The telecoms sector is largely state-owned, with expectations among analysts that parts of the market will be privatised in the near future. Iran is already the largest mobile phone market in the Middle East with more than 103m mobile connections and 47m smartphones — mostly Samsung and Huawei models — in use in 2015, according to Analysys Mason.

An already long list of international telecoms companies is lining up to enter the Iranian market to improve internet access and mobile services. Vodafone, Telecom Italia, AT&T and Nokia have rushed to get into Iran in recent months, striking deals with local groups, while Orange and Interoute, the London-based networking company, also plan to have a presence in the country. There have been 52 applications for licences to operate telecoms services since sanctions were lifted.